Bryen - Inverting the Problem of Israel

Shoshana Bryen
The Sentry
JINSA
10 July '11


http://jinsa.wordpress.com/2011/07/10/inverting-the-problem-of-israel/

The recasting of the Arab-Israel conflict into the Palestinian-Israeli conflict during the 1980s and 1990s inverted the larger/stronger party and the smaller/weaker party to the detriment of Israel. A similar inversion has taken place in President Obama’s 2010 speech on the Middle East. Rather than negotiating how much of the West Bank territory Israel will cede to the Palestinians for a state accompanied by a peace treaty with Israel, the President’s formulation assumes that the Palestinians are entitled to the whole area east of the 1949 Armistice Line (the 1967 line) except what the Palestinians agree Israel can keep. Both changes reduce the security parameters for Israel.

The historical basis of American government support for Israel was the understanding that the Arab countries did not accept the United Nations Partition Plan in 1947, refused to let the putative state of Arab Palestine emerge, and attacked Israel in an attempt to overturn the establishment of Jewish Palestine, i.e., Israel. They failed and Israel survived with somewhat more territory than the UN had planned for. But with Arab Palestine occupied and annexed by Jordan and an Armistice Line separating the two countries, the world moved on to other priorities. Until Israel acquired the territory of the defunct Palestinian Arab State through self-defense in the 1967 war, that is.

One of the great public relations tricks of all times occurred during the 1980s. The Arab states stepped back from the conflict (not because they made peace with Israel; only Egypt and Jordan did that, the Saudis, Qataris, Syrians and others pursued the war financially, politically and militarily) and pushed the Palestinians forward. The change in perspective had the effect of inverting the role of the larger/stronger party and the smaller/weaker party. In the Arab-Israel conflict, Israel was under political and military attack from the “Arab world.” In the new constellation – the Palestinian-Israeli conflict – the Palestinians are under siege from Israel.

Very little changed on the ground until the demise of the Soviet Union when the United States – as the sole remaining outside power in the region – moved to establish itself as the broker between Israel and the Palestinians, rather than supporting Israel against the Arab states.

The Oslo and subsequent Accords and Memoranda followed the pattern that Israel was strong enough to take “risks for peace,” and in those risks – or offers to the Palestinians – there would be something that would induce the Palestinians to drop their opposition to the legitimacy of Jewish sovereignty in the region and agree to a split, rump-state squeezed between Israel and Jordan (the legitimacy of which is also denied by the Palestinians). The longer the Palestinian-Israeli “negotiations” have gone on, the clearer it has become that the Palestinians have no intention – or no ability – to accede to the legitimacy of Israel.

In the post-9-11 years the US and Israel partnered greatly in the “war against terrorists and the states that harbor and support them,” which took precedence over for Israeli concessions to the Palestinians. Ten years later, however, the Obama administration has restored the Palestinian-Israeli track with the Clinton parameters – “risks for peace” taken by Israel in the hope that Palestinian concessions will be forthcoming.

With a twist.

The formulation during the Clinton Administration was, “Given that Israel controls all of the territory from the 1949 Armistice Line (the 1967 line) to the Jordan River, how much will it cede to the Palestinians for a state and under what conditions?”

The discussion was working backward from the Jordan River to the ‘67 line and the understanding that what Israel gave up would be in exchange for a political settlement. This also worked backward from Professor Eugene Rostow’s understanding that after Israel returned the Sinai (91% of the land Israel acquired in 1967) to Egypt under the terms of the peace treaty, Israel would be compliant with UN Resolution 242 – of which he was a primary drafter – whether it returned “all, some or none of the remaining territory.” The ceding of territory was to pay for Israel’s political legitimacy and security.

President Obama has reversed the understanding:

The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.

The 1967 line is the starting point of Palestine, and any land Israel is “permitted” to keep beyond that (i.e., swaps) would have to be “mutually agreed.” This gives the Palestinians a veto anything beyond the 67 line – whether the additional territory is on the east side of Jerusalem where the Jewish holy places are; on top of the mountain ridge from which Israel views the east; or along the Jordan River where Israel and Jordan cooperate on security measures crucial to both countries.

The questions are obvious: will the Palestinians accept Israel’s – and Jordan’s – need for contiguity on the Jordan River? (The President said Palestine and Jordan would have a contiguous border, meaning both Israel and Jordan would be in trouble.) Would they mutually agree that Israel could have legal control of the eastern part of Jerusalem, including Jewish holy sites? Would they agree that Israel can keep the bedroom communities around Jerusalem? What incentive is there for the Palestinians to agree to any Israeli acquisition East of the line, particularly when they haven’t actually agreed that any territory West of the line is legitimately Israel?

The President well understood that giving Palestinians veto power over Israeli control beyond the 1967 line means that the ’67 line is the most Israel can have, not the starting point for continued Israeli control in security-related, or Jewish-related places.

The nature of the changed language and the changes it portends for Israeli security cannot be overstated and should not be ignored.

Shoshana Bryen is Senior Director for Security Policy for the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs.

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.

.